I Was Once Looking From This Window
by fenrirmysaviour
Summary: A girl goes along with the Pevensies, but doesn't exactly make life easy.
1. Prologue

**Disclamer: **I don't own anything but Catherine and her family.

**A/N: **Okay, this is my first Narnia fic, so bear with me if I make mistakes and please tell me if you see them – I'm _trying_ to make this as accurate as possible. Having read the books and seen the movies, it's kind of based on both. Oh, and point out any grammatical errors and spelling mistakes if you see any, for I'd also like it to be error-free (I can only dream). So yes, please review ... any suggestions/constructive criticism welcome!

I Was Once Looking From This Window

Prologue 

The restaurant was quiet that day, which suited me fine. I never liked it when the hordes of twittering women came for their lunches, or when the men – tired out from their work – came to dine before getting down to drinking. I supposed that it was on account of the war that there weren't many customers. Before it, I was often sent to put the closed sign up because there were simply too many hungry people waiting.

My father had been a hard-working and kind man, and put his family before all else. His name was Ronald Cartwright, respectively, and he was in charge of running the business's finance. He was good at his job and managed to maintain that perfect balance between work and family.

My mother – Olivia - was the sort of woman who liked to think herself independent – she'd work long hours in the restaurant without the help of anybody else. But at the end of the day she needed our father and her children to keep her sane; if left to her own business, work could have completely consumed her. She had a very addictive nature.

By no means were we a perfect family – my elder sister, Clara, was often whining about depression in some form or another, forever secluding herself in her bedroom, unwilling to talk to anybody. My younger brother, Martin, did like to cause a fuss wherever he went, and somehow acted rather spoilt despite far from being so.

Then there was me – Catherine Olivia Cartwright. I tried to be good for my parent's sake, but I'd picked up a bitter tongue at a young age from an uncle and it would constantly cause my family distress. Clara despised it most of all, she thought me attention seeking, even when I explained to her that it was something natural within me that made me act that way.

My mother's business had flourished in that first year, in the last year of peace. We became a well-known, perfectly respectable family in the neighbourhood, with my mother's cakes adored by everybody. Of course, then the war was announced and everything had to change.

Firstly, my father was called upon to serve his country. He had left in a flurry of uniform, tears and goodbye kisses. There were no comforting words whispered in my ear about keeping strong and looking after the family. There was only a rushed kiss, pat on the head and that was all.

Next, the business began to slow and all manner of queer things happened to my mother's state of mind. I often found her muttering incoherently in the kitchens, forgetting orders and snapping unnecessarily at customers. There was nothing much I could do to help, after all she would shout any advice of mine down.

Clara moved out to live with her fiancee, a charming man ten years older than her twenty two year old self, and Martin was sent to live with an aunt. It was the aunt who didn't like me, finding me too much like her ex-husband (the rather influential volcano of sarcasm). So there was much deliberation over what to do with me - after all, it was dangerous to keep me in the city during the war.

But yes, having strayed far from the day I meant to write about, I should return to the subject at hand. I had returned from my evacuation, changed and so much older than I had been when leaving. My mind was like some kind of garden – I had begun with bulbs and pathetically tended-to twigs, and had returned with blossoms and lawns and flowers of every kind.

I had grown up, losing many of my rather more unfavourable traits, and gaining a few more along the way. In short, I was no longer that sharp, insecure and ultimately indifferent sixteen year old. Everybody had noticed the change.

I sat at the corner table, alone, silently sipping on brandy, wondering where my parents had gotten to. At nineteen years of age, my parents were allowing me to drink as much as I pleased, which was perhaps not the wisest of decisions. The cafe was, as aforementioned, scarcely filled, with only seven other occupants beside myself. I liked to sit like this, inconspicuous, listening to the laughter-filled conversations of those around me.

I had just made to stand up and find my mother myself, for I'd been waiting almost ten minutes for a mere sandwich, when Martin entered. He was holding the day's mail in his hand – because my mother left early for work, he would bring the post around sometime in the day.

Surprisingly, he came straight to me, holding out a letter with a smile. I raised my eyebrows and took it cautiously. I had never received any letters, apart from my mother when I was evacuated, and even then they were short and hurried. By the look of this envelope, the letter was several pages long.

As I gazed at the handwriting, the dull conversations around me seemed to fade into silence, and I didn't think of anything in the room. I knew that writing, though had not seen it for three years. I knew exactly who owned it, I knew how they would have wrote it – in their left hand, chin rested on their right, tapping their foot to a beat the rest of us could not hear.

I opened the letter with shaking hands, almost dropping it, and eagerly began to read. I found myself terrified about what the writing said, yet my body felt as though drunk or drugged – slow, unreactive and numb, with a wild excitement deep inside that I couldn't understand.

_Dear Cathy,_ the letter read, written in a fancy, feminine hand, though by no means was this written by a woman, _I know it's been such a long time, but I've only just acquired your address through a friend at university. You silly thing – you might have written! You knew exactly where we lived. Oh, sorry, it's so rude of me to start this way, but there are so many things I want to say and I'm not quite sure how to._

_First off, we've come across quite an unexpected problem – Susan simply doesn't believe anymore. I need to ask you, and I hope dearly you'll say yes – do you remember?_

In some previously undiscovered corner of my mind I knew that I remembered. I knew that I had been missing something these past three years, and the memory was all I had left. I knew it all – and I remembered.


	2. Chapter One: A Grave Beginning

Chapter One – A Grave Beginning 

"But you're quite, quite sure you want me to go? I really, really don't think there's a point to me travelling there. It's going to be very bothersome for you, me and the Professor. It will be an unnecessary stress upon all of our lives," I spoke very quickly and urgently, taking my mother's hands and staring as innocently as I could into her eyes. Surely nobody in their right mind could resist me? But her extremely sharp blue eyes bore into my dark ones. I had to look away.

"Now listen to me, Catherine, you're to go if you want to be safe. London is no place for a child anymore. The Professor offered to take you, so mind you don't purposely annoy the poor man, for I shan't take you back until this bloody war is over," she replied in a stern voice tinged with her Irish roots. Quickly releasing her hands for fear of seeming tender, I glared fiercely at the station floor.

"Father would never have sent me away. He'd have laughed at the thought of it! It's preposterous, that's what it is! Who do you think you are, sending me away to live with an old man and four spoilt brats?" I asked viciously. It was callous to mention my father, but since when did I care about being mean?

"Your dear old father isn't here, is he? It's no fault of mine so you can stop bringing it up as though it is. As for who I am, I'm your mother, and it's high time you realise it. Someday you'll need my guidance in life," she retorted. I could feel her cool gaze burning into me.

"You speak to me as though I'm a child! I'm sixteen, in case you've forgoteen," I sighed, in a long suffering sort of way, glancing around at the sniffling children around me. "They're pathetic, they are. Be thankful I'm not acting like them."

"Here are your things, Catherine. Remember to be good and polite, and _don't_ scare the other evacuees too much," she said wearily, handing me my train ticket and suitcase. "I shall write to you weekly."

"Yes, well, don't expect anything in reply but death threats and pleading. And for goodness sake, woma, what have you packed in here, a piano?" I groaned, gingerly testing the weight of my belongings.

"Goodbye, Catherine," my mother said curtly, inclining her head. She wasn't a woman for sentiments. I smiled half-heartedly.

"Goodbye, cruel, cold hearted witch."

And with that she promptly turned me around and pushed me in the direction of the train. I grumbled under my breath, something about being old enough to walk on my own. As I handed the woman my ticket, quite glumly, a long line of soldiers were walking past, all looking rather defeated. A couple glanced at me, for I was desperately trying to see my father among them.

Of course, I didn't.

With renewed sadness, I allowed myself to be helped onto the train by one of the station staff, and quickly sought out a compartment. There wouldn't be much point in waving to my mother from the window. After all, knowing her, she'd probably be in the car already.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

The train journey was so uneventful, there's no point in describing it. I spent it reading a book and avoiding the eyes of those sharing my compartment – two twin sisters who never ceased in their banal chatter.

So I was beyond pleased to step off the train when my time came, before realising I wasn't alone. I turned, with a heavy heart, to scrutinise the four _things_ I would have to spend the next few months – at _least_ – with. There were two girls and two boys.

The youngest looked about eight, and she was an excitable looking girl with short blonde hair and a large smile. Next was a boy of ten or eleven, with short blonde hair and freckles, who looked gloomy and distant. Then came a girl who seemed about thirteen with thick black hair and a pleasant expression. Lastly was a boy of about fifteen with light brown hair and an arm protectively around his youngest sister. I sighed. They all looked so _good_.

The train steamed off, leaving us in an awkward silence. We heard the familiar sounds of a car and leapt from the tiny raised platform. But the car merely beeped it's horn and drove on. I sighed again, more heavily this time.

"The Professor knew we were coming," the eldest girl commented. I rolled my eyes. Not only did they seem too good, they also seemed the type to state the obvious.

"Of course he knows we're coming. He's probably just a lazy git who'll pick us up when he feels like it," I explained. The youngest two gasped with uncontrollable delight at this, but the eldest two just frowned and shared a worried look.

"I think he's just late," the black haired girl smiled reassuringly.

To my relief, she was actually right. The telltale sounds of a horse's hooves sounded across the country lane. We all turned to see the source of the noise. A woman was sat in a horsecart, holding the reigns of a large and glossy white horse, as it trotted over and came to halt in front of us. I felt a little nervous then – for, I'm quite ashamed to admit it, my one fear was _horses_.

Dear old sarcastic Uncle Horace had kept two of them in the stables in his back garden. Once, when I was five or six years old, I thought it funny to tickle the horses on their chests. For some reason, they were in a little bit of a bad mood and jumped over the stable door, chasing me round the garden as I screamed.

To be blunt, I wasn't very good with animals, and since then the mere sound of horse hooves made me feel petrified. So to be face to face with this beast really didn't make me feel any kinder to the things.

Half an hour later – after an embarrassing incident involving me tripping into the horse, it rearing and the woman (Mrs MacReady) falling off on to the youngest boy – we were walking into an almost frighteningly large house to begin what seemed fated to be a disastrous evacuation.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

"So, who _are _you lot?" I asked the children later that night, as the boys crept into us girls' room for a chat (against the rules, I might add). I hadn't spoken to any of them since the falling-on-the-horse accident, as I'd had to reason to, but I thought I might as well ask their names.

"Well, we're the Pevensies. I'm Peter, and this is Edmund, Susan and Lucy," the eldest spoke, motioning to each of his siblings in turn. The prudish Pevensies, eh? "How about you?"

"Catherine O. Spencer," I said proudly. I included my middle initial because I'd heard my father do so once and anything he did was brilliant in my eyes. Peter raised his eyebrows slightly at my name, but said nothing. There was silence, until it was interrupted by a small sob from the youngest – Lucy. Peter and Susan shared another worried look and went to the end of their sister's bed.

"Wars don't last forever, Lucy. We'll be home soon," Susan smiled, in a motherly kind of way. I glumly lay back on my bed. Did she have any idea? Wars could last for years and years. We had hardly any hope of 'soon'.

"Yeah, if home's still there," Edmund muttered. I propped myself up on one elbow to study him. I hadn't given the boy much thought before, but he was making _sense_ to me, above the other's, at least. He caught my eye and I gave him a small smile and a wink. Susan, however, sighed.

"Isn't it about time you were in bed?" she asked her brother, putting one hand on her hip.

"Yes, _mum_," he replied sarcastically. I grinned.

"Ed!" Peter said, surprisingly sharply. I found disliking him more and more by the second. I even treated him to one of my frequent glares, despite the fact his eyes were fixed on a whimpering Lucy. "You saw outside. It's huge! We can do whatever we want here. Tomorrow will be great, really."

"What's that noise?" asked the youngest suddenly. It had been a sort of animal noise from outside, and normally it wouldn't have scared any of us. But I suppose being in such a large and empty house, a simple noise like that was quite daunting for her.

"It's only a bird, silly," snapped Edmund.

"It's an owl," stated Peter. "This is going to be a wonderful place for birds. I say, let's go and explore tomorrow. You might find anything in a place like this. It really will be wonderful here!"

"Oh yeah," I said, sitting up again and brushing the hair from my eyes. "It's going to be just _wonderful_. Not only is there a tremendous, foul war raging, with bombs threatening to kill our parents daily, but I'm stuck here with the prudish Pevensies!"

"Please don't scare Lucy like that," Susan chided, green eyes wide. I raised my eyebrows.

"Oh, sorry Lucy, your parents will be fine – they'll be safer dead! Now, I want some sleep, so you boys get out before I call MacReady!" I snapped, sinking back down and turning my back to them all. I heard the boys' quick goodbyes and Susan's comforting of her crying sister. Reflecting Peter's words, I smirked bitterly. Tomorrow would be great, my arse.

**A/N:** Oh dear, Catherine has quite the temper, doesn't she? Please review! Next chapter: Lucy finds something. We all know what.


End file.
